Brokers trying to stall extended trading hours

 
On Friday last the Chennai High Court admitted a petition filed by trader Uday Kumar against Sebi, NSE and BSE. It lists several points relating to the move to extend trading hours and the court will hear the case this week. Even as broking houses have tweaked the software and beefed up infrastructure for business, majority of them living in distant suburbs of Mumbai have to overcome the problem of leaving homes early.

While shifts are being introduced for traders to deal with the new timings, some broking houses have begun to provide bigger margin to clients so that the latter’s dependence on banks could be reduced in case of an emergency. Big broking houses have geared up better as their risk management analysts had prepared for margin obligations on last Friday itself. Rajesh Dedhia, FII broker says: “the real test to extend trading hours inspite of inadequate banking infrastructure will be only when markets are volatile.”

Meanwhile, domestic equities on Monday kicked off 2010 on an upbeat note, with key benchmark indices hitting multi-months high as strong auto sales, a jump in manufacturing activity in December 2009, and the latest data showing a surge in exports in November 2009, underpinned sentiment. The BSE 30-share Sensex rose 93.92 points to close at 17,559. It was the highest closing level in 20 months. The S&P CNX Nifty attained its highest closing level in 22 months at 5232. Global stocks were firm and US index futures surged.  But volumes were low on the first session of year 2010 as total traded turnover in NSE’s futures & options (F&O) segment was Rs 42,559.47 crore, sharply lower than Rs 105,421 crore on December 31, 2009.  NSE cash segment clocked a turnover of Rs 14,953 crore, much higher than Rs 11,670 crore on Friday last.
Similarly, BSE clocked a higher turnover of Rs 6,198 crore, against Rs 4618 crore on December 31, 2009.
DH News Service